An encounter with mercy

"The Incredulity of Saint Thomas" by Caravaggio

Homily: 2^nd Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday) – Cycle C

          Over the years as I have been striving to live this Christian life well I’ve found that I’ve come to appreciate more and more those persons that I’ve met or read about who have provided a “lived example” not only of achieving holiness in their lives but also of the struggle to arrive at faith and to maintain that faith throughout one’s life.  This is why I’m enjoying Pope Francis so much.  He has been providing us with a different perspective on the Christian life.  While Pope Benedict XVI invited us to know Christ in prayer, especially with the Scriptures, Pope Francis is inviting us to go out and find Christ in the poor, the marginalized, and the suffering.  With both of their lived examples, we are getting a fuller, more rounded, perspective of how to live the Christian life.

          This is why I also enjoy encountering persons like Saint Thomas in the Scriptures.  I think that it is easy for us to step back and say “Oh yeah, there’s that ‘Doubting Thomas’ again” and fall into the trap made by the Pharisee elsewhere in the Gospel who said: “I’m glad that I’m not like him, doubting the Lord’s Resurrection and all.”  It’s certainly easy for me to stand here and say, “Now don’t be ‘Doubting Thomases, but believe!” (and, if that’s all that I had to say, then I might as well just sit down, because you’ve heard all of that before).  I have a great sympathy, for Thomas, however, because there seems to be something going on with him that is deeper than just a stubborn resistance to believing that the Lord had risen.  I think that Thomas was really struggling with something deeper.

          For years, Thomas had been following Jesus closely.  He had gotten to know him and certainly he had bonded with him.  No one can be that close to Jesus—God… love incarnate—and not feel a sense of intimacy with him.  Thus, Thomas had made himself vulnerable both to him and for him: “Ok, Jesus, I believe that you are the Christ and so I am willing to proclaim this to others, even if that means that I will be ostracized and persecuted by family, friends and the people of my nation.”  Thomas was convinced that Jesus was the one for whom he had been waiting and he put all of his trust in him.  And so, when Jesus appeared to be defeated—when all seemed to be lost because Jesus had been put to death—that hurt Thomas deeply.  He loved Jesus—which was perhaps something difficult for him to admit—and Jesus seemingly let him down.  It wasn’t that he was resistant to believing, but rather that the wound was still fresh and demanded a personal encounter before it could begin to be healed.

          You know, I think that this is an experience that we see both in ourselves and in one another.  Not just the experience of being disappointed or let down by someone we’ve come to love and trust (though that experience is common enough), but also the experience of being disappointed and feeling let down by Jesus (or, at least, by his Church).  A few years ago, I shared a table at a wedding reception with a woman who had a lot of negative opinions of the Church.  I was still a seminarian at the time, and so the woman felt free to express her thoughts to me; and we had a lively, but respectful discussion.  I of course gave her (as best I could) all of the reasoned arguments about why the Church teaches this and why it can’t change that, but she didn’t seem to be buying much of it.  Finally, I realized that there was something else going on with her—that this wasn’t just a philosophical struggle with principles—and so I stopped and gently asked her: “You’ve been hurt by the Church, haven’t you?”  “Yes”, she replied.  She, like Thomas, wasn’t necessarily doubting Jesus, but she needed more than intellectual arguments and the testimony of witnesses to resolve the hurt that she was feeling inside of her.  She needed, rather, an encounter with the one who had hurt her, who had let her down, so as to reconcile that hurt before she could move forward.

          I would guess that many of us know somebody in a similar situation: somebody who has left the Church for reasons unbeknownst to us and who has strong feelings about why he or she refuses to return.  And I would guess that most of these persons have some sort of hurt or disappointment that they have experienced with the Church and that only a personal encounter with the one that has hurt them can resolve.

          In the Gospel today, Thomas receives that encounter.  Notice, however, that it wasn’t immediate.  Thomas had this news for a whole week before Christ would return to reveal himself to him.  And what a blessing it was that Christ gave him this chance to have that personal encounter that he needed to reconcile this hurt within him.  And what mercy Jesus showed him.  For he could have easily chided Thomas for his unbelief, but instead he tried to remove all barriers to his believing—to his reconciling himself to him: “Peace be with you… Come, touch my hands and put your finger into my side… do not be unbelieving, but believe.”

          My brothers and sisters, this is exactly the mercy that we commemorate today on Divine Mercy Sunday.  This is the eighth day of the Lord’s resurrection: the day when he mercifully appeared to Thomas so as to reconcile him to himself.  And so today we too are reminded that Christ offers us the same opportunity to encounter him and to reconcile our hurts with him.  He comes to us, immolated for us on this altar so as to say “Come, see my hands, touch my wounds—the wounds that I received for you—and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”  “Come,” in other words, “and be enfolded in my mercy.  I know that you’ve been hurt and I want you to be healed.  And so, whatever it is, just come.  Come and see my sorrow for your pain and let my mercy wash over you to bring you healing and peace.”

          And so, my brothers and sisters, how good it is that we are here to celebrate this great mercy.  May our hearts be open to his heart today so that we, too, may believe and, thus, may have life in his name: the life of the Resurrection… the life of mercy.

Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – April 28^th, 2019

Do less and accomplish more

Homily: The Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God – Cycle C

          Well, here we are!  It’s a new year and once again everything seems possible.  Now I suppose that perhaps more than a few of us have spent the last few weeks lamenting all that wasn’t accomplished in the past year: those resolutions we so fervently resolved which, for a multitude of legitimate reasons, perhaps never quite materialized as we had imagined they would.  Nevertheless, today everything is new and full of possibilities.  And it’s likely that many of us have made new resolutions, which, I suppose, means that we are confident that this year we will actually keep them.

          You know, I like that about us.  I like the fact that even when we don’t always accomplish what we’ve set out to do, that we don’t let that keep us from starting again.  In other words, we don’t despair that there is something more to accomplish, in spite of the fact that we’ve fallen short.  I think this is a very Catholic attitude, by the way.  As Catholics, we routinely acknowledge when we’ve failed to live up to our expectations—in other words, when we’ve “missed the mark”—and, once we do, we decide to start anew, with a clean slate, and strive once again to achieve those good goals we set for ourselves.  Sounds a little bit like the Sacrament of Reconciliation, doesn’t it?  Putting all of that aside, however, and turning back to our resolutions for this new year, I’d like to consider for a moment what it is that Mary has to teach us about making resolutions.

          Throughout these last eight days, the Gospel readings have often reminded us of how, in various situations, Mary encountered things that were distressing, confusing, and astounding; and that, after each of them, how she “held those things in her heart, reflecting on them.”  First was the message from the shepherds of what they had seen and heard from the angels.  Then was the words of Simeon in the Temple, in which he prophesied that a “sword would pierce her heart.”  Finally, there was the losing and finding of the child Jesus in the Temple, in which Jesus’ words confounded her.  After each of these situations, we are told that Mary “held these things in her heart and reflected on them.”  In other words, that she practiced silence.

          I would venture to guess that most all of our resolutions involve something active, that is, something we’d like to accomplish: I’m going to exercise more, take that trip I’ve always wanted to take, learn how to golf, or play an instrument, or how to cook.  And these are all good things, of course.  However, they are all things bound to create “mental noise”: a nagging voice in the back of our minds constantly reminding us that we have yet to accomplish the goal that we set out for ourselves.  But what if one of our resolutions this year was to reflect on more things in our hearts?  In other words, what if we resolved to “practice silence” this year?

          In his final homily of 2012, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI offered advice for how we can overcome the inevitable disappointments—both with ourselves and with the world—that we encounter in our daily lives.  He said, “we must be able to remain in silence, in meditation, in calm and prolonged reflection; we must know how to stop and think.  In this way, our mind can find healing from the inevitable wounds of daily life, can go deeper into the events that occur in our lives and in the world, and come to the knowledge that allows us to evaluate things with new eyes.”  In other words, our retired Holy Father was encouraging us to ponder more deeply the events of our lives and thus to come to see more clearly how our faith shapes our response to them and our own ability to grow within them.  (Pope Benedict, himself, would, just a couple of months after speaking these words, resign from the papacy: giving evidence that he was practicing what he preached.)

          Thus, it seems that our Blessed Mother does have something to teach us about making resolutions.  In all of these events of her life, she did not turn to media outlets to hear what everybody else was saying about what had happened in order to try and make sense of it for herself.  Rather, she turned to silence.  In other words, Mary learned to pray with these events so as to see more clearly how her faith would shape her response to them and her ability to grow within them.

          Just this past Sunday, we heard in the Gospel that after the incident in the Temple, “[Jesus] went down with [Mary and Joseph] and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them” and that he “advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God and man.”  I suspect that one of the things that he learned from his Mother—whom we venerate today precisely because she is his mother—was how to reflect on things in his heart: a skill that I suspect he perfected in the remaining “hidden years” in Nazareth before he began his public ministry.

          My brothers and sisters, Mary is our mother, too.  Perhaps this year she could teach us how to ponder deeply in our hearts: that is, how to practice silence.  In doing so, perhaps we’ll find that, in doing less, we’ve actually accomplished a whole lot more.

Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – January 1, 2019

Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God

Saying "yes", once and forever

Homily: The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph – Cycle B

          A few years ago, I was invited to a vocations awareness dinner where Archbishop Peter Sartain, was scheduled to speak.  In his talk during that dinner, he spoke of his experience of leaving his home diocese of Memphis to become bishop of the diocese of Little Rock, Arkansas; and then of leaving the diocese of Little Rock for the diocese of Joliet.  He said that, in both cases, he had to hearken back to the day of his ordination as a priest.  He said that he realized that on that day (the day of his ordination) he had said “yes” to God and that this “yes” was open ended.  In other words, he knew that his “yes” was a “yes” for whatever God, through his Church, would call him to do in the future, even if that would move him away from family and his beloved flock.  Thus, although he felt deep sadness to leave his home diocese and then his first diocese as a bishop, he trustingly accepted the call of the Church; for in his heart, he knew that he had already said “yes” to it all on the day of his ordination to the priesthood.

          In our Scriptures today, we encounter another man whose “yes” to God was open-ended, and which took him to places and experiences he never dreamed of.  Abraham (who, initially, was called simply “Abram”) was a man blessed by God and to whom God revealed himself in visions.  God had a plan for Abraham: a plan that would take him far from his native land, with only the vague assurance of prosperity when he arrived.  Abraham placed his faith in God who had revealed himself to him and set out from the land of Ur of the Chaldeans for an unknown land that he was to receive as an inheritance.

          This, of course, not only affected him, but his whole household.  His wife, Sarah, and their entire household (including his livestock) would move with him; and the hardship that they endured throughout the journey was great.  Abraham’s faith was tested—as was his relationship with his wife—but he persevered and settled in the land that God had promised him.

          Having settled in the land that God had promised to him, God promised Abraham prosperity and protection.  Abraham, however, questioned God’s promise: asking “What good will your gifts be if I keep on being childless?”  You see, these ancient peoples had not yet developed the notion of the immortal soul and so they believed that “eternal life” came from having children, in which your name—and, thus, your heritage—lived on.  Abraham didn’t want material prosperity; rather, he wanted eternal life.  Thus, God would make another promise: the promise of descendents more numerous than the stars in the sky. /// It would be many years, however, before God would fulfill this promise and grant to Abraham and his wife Sarah a son.  This was another test of Abraham’s faith: a test that, once again, affected his whole family.

          As difficult as this test might have been, there would still be one final test for Abraham.  After fulfilling his promise to give Abraham an heir, God then calls Abraham to offer his son Isaac back to him as a sacrifice.  At this point, I imagine that Abraham felt like he had had enough; and I imagine that he had to pray long and hard about whether or not he should obey.  In the end, I imagine that he thought back to that first revelation that God had given to him back in his homeland of Ur of the Chaldeans.  I imagine that he looked to that first “yes” that he had given to God and then realized that, to say “no” now, would be to negate all of the blessings that he had received by saying “yes” to everything that had come before.  In other words, he knew that his first “yes” was an open-ended one: a yes not only to God’s first command to leave his land for a land unknown to him, but also to everything that would come after; and so he said “yes” to God once again and brought his son to be offered as a sacrifice to him. /// We, of course, know the rest of this story: that God stopped Abraham from completing the sacrifice and, as the Letter to the Hebrews relates, Abraham “received Isaac back” and with it the promise of a family of innumerable descendants.

          The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph is also a family whose life was affected by an open-ended “yes” by its members.  Mary was confronted by the archangel Gabriel, who appeared to her and announced God’s incredible plan for her life.  She, however, had made a secret consecration of virginity to God and so could not comprehend how it would be possible for her to conceive the child that the angel was promising to her.  Nevertheless, she trusted in God and said “yes”: a “yes” to which she would have to return over and over again as more revelations would be made to her about who her son would be and the difficulties that he would face (and the difficulties that she would face through him)—revelations such as the one she received from the Temple prophet, Simeon.

          Joseph, too, would have to say “yes” to an angel—the one that appeared to him in a dream.  When he found that his supposedly virgin wife had become pregnant before they had consummated their marriage, he had decided to divorce her, because, as the Scriptures tell us, he was a righteous man and that was what the Mosaic Law demanded.  He, too, however, trusted in God and said “yes”: a “yes” to which he, too, would have to return in the future—such as when he was forced to flee with his family into Egypt to avoid Herod’s persecution.  His and Mary’s “yeses” to God were open-ended.  They could not foresee all that these “yeses” would demand of them, yet they trusted in God and gave them anyway; and for this, they have already received their reward.

          To this day, faithful families in the land of Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac—of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph—find themselves in similarly difficult situations.  Christians throughout the Middle East, and especially today in Syria and Iraq, are being severely persecuted by highly-organized religious extremists and they are being forced to face their “yes” that they had given to God: the “yes” to put their faith in God’s complete revelation of himself in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who came to save us from our sin and to win for us eternal life.  They are being forced to acknowledge that their “yeses” were open-ended ones: for they could not foresee that the endurance of such persecution would be demanded of them.

          Believe it or not, we are not far from this experience, either.  Although we in this country are not subject to the violent persecutions that Christians are facing in the Middle East, we are, nonetheless, suffering from a persecution no less hostile.  Instead of confronting us with the threat of death—thus forcing us to renew our “yes” to God or to abandon it all together—we are being bombarded by a cacophony of confusion, in which our modern culture seeks to twist truths so that there are no longer absolutes and then push forward secular values which must be accepted.  Refusal results in persecution: not for being Christian, per se, but rather for being “intolerant” and “bigoted”.  It has so many of us confused that we’re not sure what we’ve said “yes” to, anymore.  This confusion has disrupted our families and has even caused division within them.

          Therefore, my brothers and sisters, this feast today is calling us back to our first “yes”: the “yes” that we proclaimed at our baptism (or at our confirmation, if we were only infants at our baptism).  The “yes” to trust in God through his Son, Jesus.  The “yes” to have faith in his Church, the Body of Christ, who we are, and who, guided by the Holy Spirit, cannot err to provide for us clarity in the midst of confusion.  Like Abraham and his family, Sarah and Isaac, and like the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, and like Archbishop Sartain and the persecuted Christians in Syria and Iraq, we must remember that our “yes” was never to an idea, but to a person—Jesus, our Savior—and to his promise that, in spite of whatever difficulties we might face, we will not die, but rather will have eternal life—that is, happiness—forever with him in heaven.  God is calling us today to put our faith in his promises: the promises that are fulfilled even here in this Eucharist as we offer Emmanuel, God with us, back to him on this altar.  Come, then, let us receive the fulfillment of these promises, so that, strengthened by them, we may go forth to bring the light of this truth to a dark world, so desperately in need of it.

          And let us pray that the Holy Family may guide our families through this night and into the light of the fulfillment of God’s promises; and thus go forward in faith: for our God, who alone has the power to save us, is trustworthy.  He has promised and he will do it.  Amen.  Alleluia!

Given at Saint Anne’s Parish: Monterrey, IN & Saint Ann’s Parish: Kewanna, IN

December 30^th, 2017

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN

December 31^st, 2017

The wounds that show us his mercy

Homily: Sunday in the Octave of Easter – Cycle A

(2^nd Sunday of Easter – Divine Mercy Sunday)

          One of the things that I’ve come to realize over the years is that boys are strange.  I have many reasons for drawing this conclusion, but one in particular stands out to me today.  It’s a behavior peculiar to boys in which they readily show and compare open wounds and / or scars to one another.  Am I right?  They do this especially when the story of how those wounds / scars were obtained is something of which they were particularly proud.  While most of us would look at one of their gaping wounds and feel disgusted, a boy would say “COOOL!!!!” while the boy with the wound recounted how he obtained that wound while attempting to leap between tree limbs, like the monkeys that he saw at the zoo on the school field trip.  His wound, far from being a thing of shame for having failed in his attempt to imitate a monkey, is displayed as if it is a badge of honor for having attempted something adventurous and having survived.  Yep, boys are strange.

          Today, in our Gospel reading, we recount that, when Jesus appeared to the Apostles on Easter, He showed them the wounds in His hands and His side.  Hearing this passage again, nearly two thousand years after it was written, the oddity of this situation may no longer strike us as odd: rather, we’ve become accustomed to the idea that Jesus’ risen body retained the wounds of his crucifixion.  Perhaps we even think of this showing of His wounds in terms of the young boys who show off their wounds like badges of honor.  For the disciples, however, this whole experience was odd, frightening, and shocking: not only to see the Lord risen from the dead, but risen with the gaping wounds still in his body.  I imagine that everyone who encountered Jesus after the Resurrection must have noticed that His glorified body retained these wounds of the Crucifixion; and the fact that the wounds, themselves, remained not as scars, but as torn flesh: flesh which Thomas’ fingers and hands could probe and examine.

          Imagine, for a moment, that we were hearing this news for the first time.  Wouldn’t we stop and ask ourselves, “Why is it that Jesus chose to retain the wounds of such a gruesome death, a death that His Resurrection had powerfully defeated?  Wounds, or even scars, are imperfections.  Why, then, do the marks of Jesus’ Passion remain in His perfect, glorified flesh when, just as easily, He could have chosen not to have them?”

          As in all things, when we look for the reasoning behind the actions of God, the best place to start is always with the answer: “He did this for me.”  Remember that God never needs to act to help Himself because God is perfect in Himself.  God is also love; and so all of His actions are acts of self-giving love which are directed towards our salvation.  With this in mind, therefore, we can assume that Jesus chose to keep the wounds of the Crucifixion in His glorified body for our benefit. “He did this for me.”  This, of course, begs the next question: “If Jesus did this for me, how am I helped by encountering the wounds of the Risen Jesus as His disciples did?”

          First, the wounds of Jesus are a proof of His identity.  When Our Lord showed his hands and side to the Apostles on Easter, they rejoiced because the wounds verified that the man in front of them was truly Jesus, the crucified One, who had been raised.  There’s a legend that says that the devil once tried to fool Saint Martin of Tours into worshiping him by appearing to him dressed in fine clothes and jewelry, and claiming to be Our Lord.  Martin, however, quickly spotted the devil’s trick and said: “Where are your nail marks?  Where is the wound in your side?  When I see the marks of the Passion then I will adore Him.”  Without the wounds of the crucifixion, Martin knew it was not Jesus.

          The wounds of the Risen Christ are more than just a means of identification, however. Rather, they are integral to who He is.  Jesus cannot be separated from His wounds, even in His glorified body, because His wounds continually show us that He is Our Savior.  The Risen Lord Jesus kept the marks of His sacrifice, which freed us from our sins.  He carried in His Resurrected flesh the marks that prove that He, too, knows our physical and emotional suffering intimately, and that, through His victory, our suffering may be transformed into a means of salvation for ourselves and others.  In other words, Jesus bears the wounds of His crucifixion in his glorified body to show us that he did not come to eliminate our woundedness, but rather to redeem it.  Finally, Jesus bears the wounds of the crucifixion in His glorified body for all eternity so that we may experience the power and depth of His merciful love for us when we meet Him in the flesh, just as Saint Mary Magdalene, Saint Thomas, Saint Peter, and Saint Paul did when they themselves encountered the Risen Lord: a power and depth that we can experience when we meditate on these wounds through which he saved us.

          Saint Faustina Kowalska, the Polish mystic to whom Jesus appeared and gave the task to spread devotion to Divine Mercy, wrote in her diary: “As I was praying before the Blessed Sacrament and greeting the five wounds of Jesus, at each salutation I felt a torrent of graces gushing into my soul, giving me a foretaste of heaven and absolute confidence in God's mercy.”  Friends, Jesus’ glorified body bears the wounds of the crucifixion so as to continually invite us to approach him so as to receive his mercy.  Thus, meditating on Jesus’ Sacred Wounds is a way to put us in contact with His merciful love.

          Still more, my brothers and sisters, Our Risen Lord appears to us at each Mass—body, blood, soul, and divinity— in Holy Communion: glorified wounds and all.  Although Saint Thomas could touch these wounds with his hands, we can experience them even more intimately by entering into them each time that we receive Holy Communion.  And so, as we prepare to receive Our Lord here today, let us meditate on this great mystery of the glorified wounds of Christ, so that we, too, might feel “a torrent of graces” rushing into us, and thus receive, like Saint Faustina, “a foretaste of heaven and absolute confidence in God’s mercy.”  Filled with this confidence we ourselves, wounds and all, will be strengthened to realize our vision of a Catholic Cass County, united in the Eucharist.

          May Mary, the First Disciple of Divine Mercy, be our guide and protection as today we rededicate ourselves to this joyful work.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – April 23^rd, 2017

Mary's mysterious motherhood draws us back to Christmas reality

Happy New Year!

I pray that our Good God will bless all of you richly in 2017.

May Mary, Mother of God, keep you and protect you throughout the year.

Homily: Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God – Cycle A

          It’s no secret that I am not the world’s biggest fan of all of the secular, year-end holiday stuff that has attached itself to our celebration of the Lord’s birth on Christmas.  I’m talking about all of the sentimental holiday things—like brightly decorated trees with gaily wrapped presents underneath, snow falling in the moonlight, and egg nog by the fireplace while listening to songs that speak about all of these things without ever making reference to the reason why there is a holiday in the first place: the Child born in Bethlehem who is God and the Savior of the human race.  Those of you who heard my homily for Christmas know that I spoke about how all of these things have become signs that we have “objectified” Christmas: that is, we’ve turned what was a subjective reality (a reality in which real people had real experiences) into an object to be manipulated for our own pleasure and amusement.

          You’ll also remember that I proposed a way for us to break free from this objectification of Christmas: a return to an understanding of the original event and what it meant to those involved and to the world.  I invited us to imagine a people suffering under a great oppression—a people of strong faith in their God who had promised to send them a leader who would free them from their suffering—who then hear that the one who had been promised had, indeed, been born; and that through this imagining we would begin to understand the great prophecies that Isaiah had made about the Messiah and how the infancy narratives in the Gospels point to their fulfillment in the birth of Jesus.  I invited us to imagine the smelly, dirty, and yet gloriously real reality of the original event so as to put our modern-day celebration in its proper perspective; thus ensuring that would not objectify it, but rather celebrate it for what it truly is: the day that our salvation came to us.

          I recount all of this today because this day, the octave day of Christmas, the day in which we honor Mary under the title “the Holy Mother of God”, gives us another opportunity to shake off our “objectifications” of Christ’s birth and get back to the real subjects who had experienced this world-changing event.  Today we make a bold statement: that Mary, in every way a human being, is the Mother of God, that is, the Mother of the Infinite Being through whom all things in the universe exist and without whom no things exist.  That’s crazy, right?  How can a human being, who would not exist if it wasn’t for the pre-existence of God, never the less be the Mother of God?  If you’ve never thought of this before, then you’re not engaging your faith enough and therefore your New Year’s resolution is to open your catechism in 2017 and read it through, asking the hard questions and then letting it explain them through the richness of nearly 2000 years of thinking on God’s revelation (Got it?).  If you have thought about this before, then you are in good company.  This very belief was challenged for these very reasons nearly 1600 years ago.

          In 431, in the city of Ephesus, an ecumenical council was held to resolve this issue.  Nestorius, the bishop of Constantinople at the time, contended that it was heretical to call Mary the “Mother of God” for the very reasons to which I’ve already alluded.  Since God is eternal, Nestorius argued, to say that God has a mother is contradictory: because for someone to have a mother indicates that there was some sort of birth, or beginning, to that person’s life, which with God simply cannot be.  He contended that she could be called “Mother of Jesus”, but not “Mother of God”.

          St. Cyril, who was the bishop of Alexandria, knew that this couldn’t be true, because he knew that for Jesus to be able to accomplish his saving work for us he had to be both fully human and fully divine and that there could be no separation or “compartmentalization” of the two.  He also knew that in the hearts of the faithful (i.e. the whole Church for the previous four centuries) Mary had been honored as Mother of God, and so he knew that he couldn’t give way to Nestorius’ erroneous thinking and thus contradict what had already been held as true (though not concretely defined as such) for nearly four centuries.

          Legend has it that crowds of people waited outside the basilica during the last days of the council waiting to hear what the bishops had decided the truth was about Mary.  When the bishops emerged and definitively declared that Mary was, indeed, the Mother of God, the crowd erupted with joy that the bishops had confirmed what they already knew in their hearts was true.  They purportedly carried the bishops through the streets along with images of Our Lady, singing songs and praising God that Mary is, indeed, the Mother of God.

          This is important to us today for two reasons: One is that, in preserving for us the mysterious declaration that Mary is truly the Mother of God (because she is the Mother of Jesus, who is the Son of God), who Jesus is for us is also preserved (that is, God incarnate: the fullness of whose humanity made it possible that his death and resurrection from the dead—both in the flesh!—would redeem our sins and make eternal life possible for us once again).  And so we see that, if Mary cannot be called the Mother of God, then there is no reason for us to celebrate Christmas: because without the fullness of Jesus’ divinity (and, therefore, the fullness of Mary’s Divine Maternity), the day of our salvation has not come for us and we must lament that eternal life still is not possible for us.

          Second, in preserving for us the mysterious declaration that Mary is truly the Mother of God, we also preserve the reality that God, in spite of all that he has revealed to us, is still clouded in mystery for us.  In other words, by not having a “how” to explain the “what” of Mary’s Divine Motherhood, we preserve our right relationship with God: the relationship that acknowledges that he is the all-powerful, pre-existent Being and that we are his creatures who will never fully understand his wisdom or his power.  This humility before the mystery that is God helps to prevent us from “objectifying” events like Christ’s birth (and, thus, appropriating it into something that fits into our lives and makes us feel good instead of moving us more deeply into the mystery of who God is in himself), which can only deepen our love for him as we contemplate the great love that he must have for us to act in our lives in these ways.

          My brothers and sisters, this is the example that Mary herself gives us.  When the shepherds came to see the baby Jesus, they revealed to Mary and Joseph all that they had seen and heard in the field: Angels in the air revealing the birth of the child and singing songs glorifying God.  Mary didn’t press the shepherds to explain how all of that could have possibly happened, but rather, as the Gospels relate to us, she and all there “were amazed by what had been told them by the shepherds … and Mary kept all of these things, reflecting on them in her heart.”  Mary allowed herself to dwell within the mystery of what had been revealed and there she encountered deeply the One who had revealed it: God in her son.

          As we enter into this new year, the challenge for each of us is to allow ourselves to dwell within the mystery of how God has revealed himself to us so as to open ourselves to encountering there God’s presence in the unexpected: like in a little child, born into poverty in a little town in ancient Palestine, or under the appearance of bread and wine right here on this altar.  If we can do this, my brothers and sisters, the Lord will “bless us and keep us” in 2017.

          May the peace of God, which is beyond all understanding, keep your hearts and your minds in the knowledge and love of God and of his son, our Lord Jesus Christ so that you, too, may enjoy this blessing in the New Year.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN

December 31^st, 2016 & January 1^st, 2017

Be like the shepherds for a better 2016

Homily: The Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God – Cycle C

          For those of you who know me a little, you’ll know that I’m not necessarily a fan of all of the Christmas hype that leads up to Christmas.  As Catholics, our pattern is always “fast” before “feast” and every year our society hijacks Christmas and makes it “feast” and then “feast”.  It’s exhausting work trying to resist all of that pre-Christmas, Christmas feasting and, to be honest, it took me until a couple of days ago before I could step back and really delight in the fact that it was Christmas.  What a good thing, then, that, for Catholics, Christmas Day extends eight whole days!  That’s right, I said that Christmas Day, itself, is celebrated for eight days.  While the rest of the world has been regretting their bloated stomachs after having feasted on Christmas for over a month, we are joyfully concluding our celebration of the Octave of Christmas.  Thus, while the rest of the world is putting away Christmas, we are here, singing “Glory to God in the highest” as if it was still Christmas morning.

          Now, the fact that there are significantly less people here today than there were on Christmas morning indicates to me that we have some work to do in educating our brothers and sisters about how Catholics celebrate the great feasts of Our Lord.  Perhaps, however, we can see in ourselves those poor shepherds to whom the birth of Christ was proclaimed in the middle of that first Christmas night: as if we have been entrusted with a message that others had not received; and, as we have gathered today, perhaps we can look to them for how to use this celebration as a way to launch us into 2016 towards becoming better disciples of Jesus.

          Saint Luke paints a beautiful picture of those poor, hardworking shepherds making their way to the stable cave in Bethlehem; but, it begs the question: Where did Saint Luke find out about this encounter?  Remember, he wasn't there.  There were no newspapers to cover the story and there weren’t any Apostles yet who could have witnessed it.  So, how did he find out?  Perhaps he heard it second-hand from Jesus through one of the Apostles.  Given the amount of detail included, however, it seems more likely that an eyewitness told him about it.  Given that Joseph was deceased before Jesus had manifested himself publicly and that we have no Scriptural record of any of the shepherds or magi reappearing later as Jesus’ disciples, it’s probably safe to bet that Mary was that eyewitness that shared these stories with Luke.  And we see that, when she told him, she chose her words carefully in order to make the full meaning of these events come out.  Thus, the three “verbs” that describe the actions taken by the shepherds are not mere coincidence; rather, they are the inspired message that reveals a pattern of how each of us can better live our discipleship of Jesus and proclaim the message of Christmas.

          First, Saint Luke tells us that the shepherds "went in haste" to find the child about whom the angel spoke.  Amazed as they were by what they had seen, they were even more eager to meet this newborn Savior, and, perhaps, somehow, to receive his blessing.  The history of humanity is the history of a people lost in darkness and searching for meaning, purpose, and light.  God's promise of blessing, redemption and everlasting life—in other words, the fulfillment of all that we are searching for—is what Christ came to give us and it is the message that we receive at Christmas; which is why we, like the shepherds, should be eager to go and look for the Christ—that is, to "make haste" to find him—each and every day through prayer, reading the Bible, and celebrating the sacraments.

          Second, Saint Luke tells us that the shepherds “made known the message” that had been told them.  The news the angel announced to them was too good for them to keep to themselves and so they felt a need to share it—that is, to tell others about the Savior—which, it can be said, is always a sign of an authentic encounter with God.  I mean, when we have or discover something wonderful, we don’t hold it back, do we?  No, we share it!  (…on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, etc.)  Thus, when we truly experience Christ, even just a little bit, something similar happens. Our hearts automatically overflow with a desire to share that experience.  And if we don't feel that desire, it probably means that our friendship with Christ could use a little maintenance.  What better reason, then, to "make haste" to Bethlehem to have a fresh encounter with our Savior so as to become eager once again to “make known the message” of our redemption.

          Third, Saint Luke tells us that, after the shepherds made haste to come and see Jesus, and after they told their amazing story to everyone who would listen, they "returned glorifying and praising God."  And so we see that, when we seek Christ and share this Good News, he fills our hearts with a deep, inner joy that overflows in words of glory and praise to God.  The shepherds were so full of this joy that they couldn't hold it in.  And so the same can be true for us: if we follow in the shepherds' footsteps this year—actively seeking Christ in prayer, the Bible, and the sacraments, as well as bringing Christ's grace and presence to those around us—everything in our lives will be infused with the joy of Christmas and we, too, will go forth from here, glorifying and praising God for his incredible mercy.

          Nevertheless, we know that life for the shepherds didn't end on Christmas.  Rather, they had to return to the “humdrum” of their daily lives.  And after our holiday breaks, each of us will return to the “humdrum” of our daily lives, too.  And so, how can we keep the meaning and lessons of Christmas shining in our hearts even after we take down the Christmas lights?  For this we look to Mary, whose divine motherhood we remember in a special way today.

          Mary didn't let the hustle and bustle of daily life drown out the beauty and wonder of Christmas.  Rather, as Saint Luke records for us, "Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart."  In other words, she pondered deeply these great mysteries that she was experiencing so as to keep the joy that filled her at Christmas fresh and full in her heart.  This is a pattern for all of us: to keep the great mysteries that we have celebrated here at Christmas close in our hearts so that the joy of receiving the Christ child will remain fresh and full in our hearts throughout this new year.

          My brothers and sisters, today in Holy Communion we will receive the Body of Christ, which was formed in the womb of Mary.  When we do, let's ask our spiritual Mother, the Mother of God and of all Christians, to teach us how to take care of the precious faith we have received and renewed during these days, just as she took care of the baby Jesus.  Then we will be ready to go forth from here, glorifying and praising God, as we make haste to share this good news—that the Christ of God has come to us and that he has saved us.  Halleluiah!  Let me say it again: the Christ of God has come to us and he has saved us!

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – January 1^st, 2016

Have you been hurt? There's mercy for that...

My first Octave of Easter as a priest!  What a joy to celebrate with my new family in Logansport.  What a great grace is God's mercy!  I hope that you all can see and experience God's mercy in your life.  Please enjoy my homily and I hope that it can bring you closer to God and his great mercy.  Peace!

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Homily: 2nd Sunday of Easter – Cycle C

Over the years as I have been striving to live this Christian life well I’ve found that I’ve come to appreciate more and more those persons that I’ve met or read about who have provided a “lived example” not only of achieving holiness in their lives but also of the struggle to arrive at faith and to maintain that faith throughout one’s life.  This is why I’m enjoying Pope Francis so much already.  He has been providing us with a different perspective on the Christian life.  While Pope Benedict XVI invited us to know Christ in prayer, especially with the Scriptures, Pope Francis is inviting us to go out and find Christ in the poor, the marginalized, and the suffering.  With both of their lived examples, we are getting a fuller, more rounded, perspective of how to live the Christian life.

This is why I also enjoy encountering persons like Saint Thomas in the Scriptures.  I think that it is easy for us to step back and say “Oh yeah, there’s that ‘Doubting Thomas’ again” and fall into the trap made by the Pharisee elsewhere in the Gospel who said: “I’m glad that I’m not like him, doubting the Lord’s Resurrection and all.”  It’s certainly easy for me to stand here and say, “Now don’t be ‘Doubting Thomases, but believe!” (and, if that’s all that I had to say, then I might as well just sit down, because you’ve heard all of that before).  I have a great sympathy, for Thomas, however, because there seems to be something going on with him that is deeper than just a stubborn resistance to believing that the Lord had risen.  I think that Thomas was really struggling with something deeper.

For years, Thomas had been following Jesus closely.  He had gotten to know him and certainly he had bonded with him.  No one can be that close to Jesus—God… love incarnate—and not feel a sense of intimacy with him.  Thus, Thomas had made himself vulnerable both to him and for him: “Ok, Jesus, I believe that you are the Christ and so I am willing to proclaim this to others, even if that means that I will be ostracized and persecuted by family, friends and the people of my nation.”  Thomas was convinced that Jesus was the one whom he had been waiting for and he put all of this trust in him.  And so when Jesus appeared to be defeated—when all seemed to be lost because Jesus had been put to death—that hurt Thomas deeply.  He loved Jesus—which was perhaps something difficult for him to admit—and Jesus seemingly let him down.  It wasn’t that he was resistant to believing, but rather that the wound was still fresh and demanded a personal encounter before it could begin to be healed.

You know, I think that this is an experience that we see both in ourselves and in one another.  Not just the experience of being disappointed or let down by someone we’ve come to love and trust (though that experience is common enough), but also the experience of being disappointed and feeling let down by Jesus (or, at least, by his Church).  A few years ago, I shared a table at a wedding reception with a woman who had a lot of negative opinions of the Church.  Being a seminarian at the time, the woman felt free to express her thoughts and we had a lively, but respectful discussion.  I of course gave her (as best I could) all of the reasoned arguments about why the Church teaches this and why it can’t change that, but she didn’t seem to be buying much of it.  Finally, I realized that there was something else going on with her—that this wasn’t just a philosophical struggle with principles—and so I stopped and gently asked her: “You’ve been hurt by the Church, haven’t you?”  “Yes”, she replied.  She, like Thomas, wasn’t necessarily doubting Jesus, but she needed more than intellectual arguments and the testimony of witnesses to resolve the hurt that she was feeling inside of her.  She needed, rather, an encounter with the one who had hurt her, who had let her down, so as to reconcile that hurt before she could move forward.

I would guess that many of us know somebody in a similar situation: somebody who has left the Church for reasons unbeknownst to us and who has strong feelings about why he or she refuses to return.  And I would guess that most of these persons have some sort of hurt or disappointment that they have experienced with the Church and that only a personal encounter with the one that has hurt them can resolve.

In the Gospel today, Thomas receives that encounter.  Notice, however, that it wasn’t immediate.  Thomas had this news for a whole week before Christ would return to reveal himself to him.  And what a blessing it was that Christ gave him this chance to have that personal encounter that he needed to reconcile this hurt within him.  And what mercy Jesus showed him.  For he could have easily chided Thomas for his unbelief, but instead he tried to remove all barriers to his believing—to his reconciling himself to him: “Peace be with you… Come, touch my hands and put your finger into my side… do not be unbelieving, but believe.”

My brothers and sisters, this is exactly the mercy that we commemorate today on Divine Mercy Sunday.  This is the eighth day of the Lord’s resurrection: the day when he mercifully appeared to Thomas so as to reconcile him to himself.  And so today we too are reminded that Christ offers us the same opportunity to encounter him and to reconcile our hurts with him.  He comes to us, immolated for us on this altar so as to say “Come, see my hands, touch my wounds—the wounds that I received for you—and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”  “Come,” in other words, “and be enfolded in my mercy.  I know that you’ve been hurt and I want you to be healed.  And so, whatever it is, just come: come and see my sorrow for your pain and let my mercy wash over you to bring you healing and peace.”

And so my brothers and sisters, how good it is that we are here to celebrate this great mercy.  May our hearts be open to his heart today so that we, too, may believe and, thus, may have life in his name: the life of the Resurrection… the life of mercy.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – April 7th, 2013

The Sunday of Divine Mercy